Bengaluru-based gaming startup Matiks has raised $10 million in a pre-Series A funding round led by General Catalyst, as its math, logic and puzzle gaming platform gains traction among mobile users. The company plans to use the capital to expand internationally, develop new games and build an AI-powered tool that allows users to create and publish their own games.
The round also saw participation from entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala and existing investors Info Edge Ventures, Tanglin Venture Partners and Untitled Ventures. With this investment, Matiks has raised more than $13.5 Mn in total funding.
Founded in 2024 by Sudhanshu Bhatia, Mohan Kumar and Sushant Timmapur, the startup is building a social gaming platform around mental maths, puzzles, memory and logic. Its growth has accelerated in 2026, with daily active users rising from around 22,000 earlier in the year to more than 300,000 by September.
The platform recorded 2.2 million monthly active users in September, according to the company’s reported figures. It also saw users play around 48 million games during the month, highlighting the level of activity behind the funding round.
How Matiks Turns Brain Games Into Social Competition
Matiks lets users practise games against bots before competing with real players. Its categories include Math, Puzzle, Memory and Logic, with challenges, quests, points and streaks designed to encourage repeat play.
Sudhanshu Bhatia, who has a background in competitive mental maths, began exploring the idea while working at American Express. The founding team saw an opportunity to make mental exercises more entertaining by adding the competitive and social features commonly found in gaming.
Rather than relying solely on longer gaming sessions, Matiks focuses on activities that users can complete in a few minutes. The approach gives the platform a place between casual mobile gaming, brain-training apps and social competition.
The company has also introduced SNAC, a single player puzzle format designed to deepen engagement. Matiks says sessions that include SNAC run approximately three times longer, although the company has not disclosed the revenue contribution of the format.
Matiks Plans Global Expansion and AI Game Creation
The fresh funding will support expansion into international markets, product development and increased investment in engineering, AI, design and game development.
Most Matiks users are currently based in India, but the company has reported early traction in the United States, South Korea and Japan. It plans to prioritise the US initially while using localisation to strengthen its presence in markets such as South Korea and Japan.
Another focus is Jelo, an experimental game-creation platform that allows users to build games for others to play. Matiks plans to develop this into an AI-powered engine that lets people create, publish and share brain games without writing code.
If successful, the move could expand the range of games available on Matiks without requiring the company to develop every experience internally. It would also bring new challenges around content quality, moderation and keeping players engaged.
Can Matiks Turn User Growth Into Revenue?
Until recently, Matiks had focused largely on growing its player base. It began testing a subscription offering in October 2026, with features such as game analysis, practice tools, tips and additional functionality. The app also offers in-game purchases that let users skip certain challenges, protect streaks or boost experience points.
This makes monetisation a key next step. A large active user base can attract investors, but a sustainable gaming business also needs to convert engagement into recurring revenue without making the experience frustrating for players.
Matiks has reported encouraging retention figures among users who complete a seven-day streak, while some early user cohorts have continued using the platform over longer periods. These are company-reported metrics, and their significance will depend on how they translate into paid subscriptions and repeat spending.
For General Catalyst and the existing investors, the opportunity is to back a social gaming platform that could grow beyond a collection of puzzles into a broader community for competitive brain games and user-created content.
The next phase will test whether Matiks can maintain its rapid user growth, establish a stronger international presence and build a business model that supports its ambitions. Its ability to combine competitive play with user-generated games could become a key differentiator as the platform scales.
